


Life after death

by Ziffy



Series: The Infested Chronicles [1]
Category: Warframe
Genre: Zombies are people too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-27
Updated: 2019-07-27
Packaged: 2020-07-21 07:50:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19998451
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ziffy/pseuds/Ziffy
Summary: Not all infested strains are the same. In fact, some can be quite kind.





	Life after death

**Author's Note:**

> Wtf are names even. Hard enough to think of normal names, now I gotta think of ones that sound Corpus-y? Yikes.

“Sector clear, no sign of the infested yet!”

_“Roger that, continue salvage operations.”_

Hearing that didn’t make me feel any better. I knew I was here as more of a supporting role, being the engineer overseeing our proxies, but that didn’t make the danger any less present. Our little salvage team had been working for two hours already, trying to pry Orokin tech out of the derelict. We hadn’t really found very much, and somehow, thank the Void, we hadn’t come across any of those _things_. If they came at us from the wrong direction at this point, we would be totally fucked, no two ways about it. I had a couple small drones watching the hallways so we would have a little warning, but with _them_ , it’s never enough.

“Ooh, here’s some good stuff.”

“Nice, maybe we’ll actually get paid overtime for this job.”

“Hah, no chance of that, you know how stingy the bosses are.”

“And that’s why we have the black market.” The one that said that, the youngest member of our crew, swiftly got clocked on the head by the other two.

“Shaddap, kid, not when there’s a chance they can hear us!”

“Oh come on, you know that they always leave us for dead on these missions. That’s why they give us the smallest possible ship. All to cut losses should they arise.”

The mood in the air was noticeably more solemn after that. For a couple minutes, nobody said anything as they worked to pry out the… whatever it was. A loud _twang_ sounded, and the guy (I think his name was Kerric? He just joined) fell over, the machinery on top of him. He let out a pained wheeze, and the other two laughed while helping him get it off.

“Man, you’re dumb as bricks, you know that?”

“Git off my case, lady! I know I’m young, but I can work just as hard as the rest of you.”

Syro smacked him upside the head. “That’s Miss Team Leader to you, boy!”

“Did anyone ask why we got the kid for this mission?”

“I think either nobody wanted the job, or we were just shorthanded, don’t remember which.”

“Uh, I’m right here.”

“Hah, so you are!”

They kept bickering as they loaded the piece on the cart. I called out that it was full, and someone should take it back. Syro grabbed Kerric and started bringing the loot back to our ship, leaving me with Pops. Void knows how that old man kept going in the salvage business, but he's always had a perfect record, so he must've been doing something right. We walked a little further, and he pointed out a panel to me. His intuition for this stuff is amazing, so I started prying into it. Just a few moments later, though, he looked up.

“I think it’s time we left.”

Seconds later, one of my drones saw a crawler. It was nonchalantly wandering around, but if it found us, it wouldn’t take long for faster ones to come. My suit was far heavier than his, so I waved at him to go ahead. I sent a shield osprey with him to maybe help protect him as he darted back to the ship. All of a sudden, every drone under my purview pinged me, all of them showing a similar shape. There were runners, converging on our escape path. I looked at Pops’ cursor, seeing that he was going to be just fine, and I noticed that the other two were still at the ship. Moving as fast as I could, I started sending commands to my offensive units around me. The handful of MOAs and single attack drone got ready to intercept, while my favorite shield drone (heavily modified, just the way I like it) watched over me. I kept looking at my position, and the infested converging on me, and came to a sickening realization: I wouldn’t make it.

Despite this, I wasn’t going to go down without a fight. I released every limiter on my offensive units, and they started blasting into the horde. I was so close, just a hundred meters from the ship. I could see the others, rifles blazing as they kept the extraction point clear. My muscles were screaming at me, I wasn’t used to all this exercise. I just wanted to get back to my workshop, and finish the dozen projects I had going.

75 meters to go. Two of my MOAs are down.

50 meters to go. They got my attack drone somehow.

25 meters to go. The others are screaming to hurry, when all of a sudden, I keeled over. I only had long enough to wonder where my leg went before I got completely swarmed. I saw Pops shake his head, and the other two had tears streaming down their faces. The door closed, and their ship left.

It felt like my body was on fire, the disease spreading through my veins, twisting me into something else. I don’t know if I was screaming or not, I wasn’t really sure I had a voice any more. Eventually, it reached my brain, and I was finally allowed to sleep.

…

_Is our new friend awake?_

_We don’t know, we did treat him kinda rough since he made us mad._

_Yeah, it’s not very nice to shoot at people that just want to be your friend!_

_We know, but he didn’t. Maybe he’ll know soon though!_

…

_Young one, have you awoken yet?_

I rolled over, and winced. My whole body ached, and I wasn’t sure why.

_Ah good, you can finaly move again. Welcome to your second life, young one._

I opened my eyes and flopped around a little more. I was greeted by the sight of an ancient, but instead of feeling scared, I felt safe.

_Welcome to being one of us. I can see that you are confused, which is curious. Most who change forget everything, and are born anew, but it seems you retained some memories. Is that correct?_

I tried to speak, but only a scratchy groan managed to escape me.

_No, young one. We do not need things such as speech here. Simply embrace your connection to the rest of us._

I thought for a bit, trying to relax. _Where am I?_ I thought as hard as possible.

_You’re getting the hang of this quickly, that’s good. As an answer, you are simply here. After we changed you, we left you alone until we sensed you waking back up._

_How long have I been asleep?_

_Only a matter of months, I would say. But then, time doesn’t mean much to one as old as me._ After “saying” that, the ancient gave off the mental equivalent of a laugh, which was more of a wash of pure amusement. The feeling was really something else, something incredible. _When you’ve found your legs, come find me._ The ancient wandered off.

_What about my proxies?_ I called out as it left.

_Your machines? They’re waiting around you. We’ve never managed to wake up machines, but you’re welcome to try._

I looked around, and saw it was right. The MOAs and my two drones were lying around me, still mostly intact somehow. I crawled towards my shield drone and inspected it. It looked like the growths on it were superficial, none of it having messed with the circuitry. A thrill of hope went through my right hip as I thought about how I might fix it. I looked at my hands, realizing that the task might be a bit difficult. I only had five fingers across both hands now, several of them having fused together. I gritted my left ear, determined to overcome this. My first mission, though, was to figure out how to walk again.

…

Life among the infested was a strange affair here. This was a relatively small derelict ship, and over the years, the particular strain of disease here had mellowed out. The ancient told me of other strains that thought only of killing, some that grew to unimaginable sizes, and others that didn’t think at all. Actually, on our derelict there were two strains. One was for the Aware, like me, and the other was a structural form that moved and shaped the ship itself at a glacial pace.

The ancient actually enjoyed making use of the structural growth. It had discovered over the years that the growths could be coaxed in certain directions, and that they could move metal around through some unknown mechanism. The ancient revealed to me a special room that was referred to by everyone as “the garden.” It was one of the larger rooms in the ship, and it was truly stunning. Metal flora stretched into the sky, being dragged up by the meticulously attended growths. Murals were etched into the walls, with figures sticking nearly half a meter out in some parts. And in the center, a glowing Orokin artifact was surrounded in polished leaves of metal, giving the whole room a very curious effect, much like what I imagined the forests of Earth might be like. The ancient always gave off a very peaceful feeling when we were in the garden. Perhaps some part of its subconscious remained from before, however long ago that was.

The other infested, however, were far less calm. The chargers loved headbutting each other as hard as possible, resulting in some of the most incredible noises. They asked me if I would like to join in, but I quickly said I’d rather not. The runners and leapers love trying to outdo each other in acrobatics of various sorts, and the ancient has shaped them a couple rooms full of intricate arenas for them to experiment with. There aren’t very many crawlers here, but the few that there are have managed to figure out a way to stack up to make a strange figure. It takes a lot of effort for them, though, so they mostly crawled around the garden, helping the ancient with the more intricate parts. I believe they were actually largely responsible for one of the murals, though I still have yet to figure out what it’s of. But the ancient was proud of their work, and the mural had a special beam of light to make it extra noticeable.

I don’t really know what I would have qualified as. I suppose I was most similar to a runner or a leaper, but I didn’t really feel like moving much. I wasn't old enough to be an ancient, and I definitely was not a crawler or charger. I just kept tinkering with my old machines, trying to get them to work again. The ancient would drop by once in a while, sometimes bringing me things it found from the derelict that I might find useful. The ancient is very kind to us. I actually somehow had an assistant, if you could call it that. The smallest charger is curious about my “shinies,” and tried to help whenever possible. This mostly was by holding parts in place with its clumsy paws while I did the finer work. Still, the sentiment was OPmuch appreciated.

After a time, I had completely repaired my proxies. The only problem was, none of them would turn on. I was incredibly frustrated, and spent a couple days wandering the derelict, looking for inspiration. The charger followed me, dancing around with the simple joy of being alive. Eventually, I walked into the garden, and lay down on the floor.

Some time later, the ancient brought me a curious object. It was a tiny piece of electronics from somewhere in the ship, and at first glance that was all. But when I looked closer, I saw that there were tiny growths along it, carefully mimicking the circuitry. I jumped up, thanking the ancient, and stumbled back to my machines.

Along the way, I mentally banged my neck on the wall for not thinking of it myself. I was so focused on repairing the machines the way my previous self would have, rather than trying to take advantage of what I was now! When I got there, I rocked back on my ankles and got to work. I coaxed the small strain of infestation from the chip onto one of the MOAs and fed it some of my own mass to help it spread. My assistant volunteered some of its body too, but I declined on account of not knowing if it was truly necessary. After that, we waited.

The strain changed as it worked through the MOA, growing faster as it mutated to fit my needs. I coaxed it through the whole body, and when it had finally been overcome, it began to move. Strangely, I felt connected to it, in a similar way as with the other infested, though in a more one-directional capacity. It was almost like giving them orders before, but more like they were an extension of my body. When I asked the charger if it felt the same, it said it couldn’t feel it very well at all. I decided to try using some of its matter for the next one to see if that was the answer. Sure enough, after transferring the new strain to another MOA and feeding it a tiny piece of both the charger and myself, we could both feel and control the machine. The charger ran off with the MOA to show the others. While it had its fun, I worked on breathing life into the last of my proxies. The joy of seeing by old shield osprey fly again was incredible. The way that the strain changed my machines made them look so interesting, almost beautiful to me.

When I had revived all of them, I went to find the ancient. I showed it what I had done, and after methodically looking them over, it spoke. _I’m so happy that you managed to revive your machines. You always felt so sad before, but I can feel that_ you _feel whole again. Perhaps in life these were more of an extension of yourself than you thought?_

After saying this, the ancient went back to its unhurried work in the garden. This praise coming from it meant the world to me, though, and I wandered the derelict for a while basking in it.

As I went around the ship, showing my friends the revived machines, many of them were creeped out that they couldn’t feel them. I promised that it was only temporary, and that they would be able to if they wanted. Those that did gave me a piece of themselves, and after feeding it to the machines, they felt much more comfortable.

Having finished reviving them, however, was not enough. After all, I once was an engineer, and that meant I needed to create progress! I hunted around the ship, trying to find pieces that would work, but there were only a handful of old Corpus parts that the structural strain hadn’t changed into something else. I gathered up what I could find and got to work. Ultimately, I wanted to try making an infested hyena model, but I wasn’t totally sure how to approach it. Luckily, time was all I had anymore.

…

“But sir, haven’t we already hit that ship enough times? I personally was on an expedition to that one!”

 _“You have your orders.”_ The line went dead.

“Dammit, I hate my boss!”

…

I was so close to getting my experimental hyena working, but I was missing some parts. I thought about trying to use the structural strain to etch what I needed, but only the ancient and the crawlers have the patience needed for that. In the meantime, I was adjusting my MOAs to give them each a personality. They definitely felt different, like individuals, so I felt they should look it too. As I was putting the finishing touches on the third one, I felt a tingle through my friends’ link. One of the runners thought it saw something interesting and was going to check it out. I was nearby, so I started heading over too. I sent my infested attack drone ahead to scout.

What its sensors sent back to me made my shoulder blade ache. There was a Corpus salvage unit here trying to gather the last of the Orokin tech. I thought one of them was familiar, but I guess that part of my memory was too messed up to see clearly. _We have visitors, everyone, but I think we should leave them alone. They have lots of guns, and they look ready to use them._

Unfortunately, as soon as I told them there were visitors, the more excitable of my friends started charging over to see. I tried to get them to calm down, but they were too excited at the prospect of making new friends to listen. The salvage team caught on and started engaging. The first of my friends to get shot was my assistant, the little charger. I felt a shadow of the pain course through my own body, and it was like a piece of my mind went dark. I ran as fast as I could, screaming at the others to run away, but by now they were angry at one of us being killed. When I finally reached the area, seven of us had been killed, and more were wounded. I tried to think through the screaming pain that my mental link was giving me, trying to find a way to make it stop. I reached out and found that one of the MOAs and my shield osprey had speakers. Putting every ounce of focus I could into it, I shouted through my proxies and my mental link, **_“EVERYBODY STOP!”_**

Shocked, the Corpus stopped firing, and my friends turned to face me. _Please everyone, go away, they’re too dangerous to be our friends. I don’t want to lose any more of you!_

Slowly, my infested friends trickled out of the room. The salvage team looked on, dumb with shock, simply waiting to see what would happen next. I stumbled over to a body, and saw that indeed, my assistant had been killed. A deep sadness settled in my lung.

I turned to the Corpus, and using my proxies I began to speak with them. I tried to tell them about how the others were almost childlike in their pursuit of friends, and how we didn’t want to fight. They asked if they could continue salvaging (I suppose simply being alive was enough reason for them to roll with the punches) and after a brief chat with the others, I confirmed their safety.

I watched them as they worked, the feeling that one of them was familiar still nagging at the back of my mind. I had my shield osprey look closer, and it caught an ID number. It immediately returned a name from what remained of its memory banks.

“ _Syro, is that you?_ ”

She looked up, shocked. Warily, she asked, “how do you know my name?”

“ _I think I used to know you, before I turned._ ”

She thought for a bit, looking at my proxies. “No, no, that’s not possible, that was years ago. I saw you get killed with my own eyes.” Her breath caught in her throat a little as she finished the statement.

“ _No, it’s actually me. Somehow, I kept part of my memories from before, though it looks like some of my memories are bound up in my proxies. I think I’ll have to look into that once I get a chance, though I don’t know how success-_ “

“Stop it, you. It always was hard getting you to talk, but once you started you would keep on rambling. I guess it really is you in there.”

I noticed at this point that the others were wrapping up the operation, bringing their meager pickings back to the ship.

“ _I guess it’s time for you to go…_ ”

“Yeah. I guess- I guess it was good to know you’re still alive.”

“ _Will I ever see you again?_ ”

“I don’t know. I’m going to mark down this ship as completely picked clean, so there won’t be any missions sent here again.” She paused. “I suppose, maybe if I get a calmer reception next time, I could find a way to visit.” She turned to get on her little salvage ship.

Some part of me felt it was appropriate, so while the doors were closing, I called out, “ _I love you!_ ”

She turned, and just before they left, I saw her put her hand on the glass separating us.

…

A little later, the ancient arrived in the room where our dead lay. It touched every corpse, and a deep sadness washed through our link. All the others had gathered around, silently watching. The ancient turned to me. _I can revive our friends after they have fallen, but they are never the same. Once they have been killed like this, a piece of their soul is permanently lost. Do not be surprised when they are not who you once knew._

After healing them, the ancient left. Our revived friends slowly started getting up, and wandered away with small groups of others, explaining what happened. I watched as the little charger got up, now even smaller, and my spleen fell as it listlessly followed some others out of the room. I sat, taking in what had happened in just the last day. Why did it have to be this way? Why did the infestation have to be so feared because of a few bad strains? We just wanted to live, like everything else in the system.

I went back to my projects, and after some time had passed my sadness washed away. I regained my assistant, but it didn’t put any of the same life into the work as it did before. It seemed to be so tired and ended up resting most of the time in my work area. After some chats, I regained a spark of hope, as I found that the charger’s mind was still pretty much the same as before, it just couldn’t muster up any energy to do what it loved.

_If energy is the only problem, what if I tried to fuse you with some of my machinery?_ I glanced at my half-finished attempt at a hyena. The charger sighed an affirmative, and the experiment began.

…

Many years later, a gentle knock was heard on the outside of the ship.


End file.
